Insights

Marketing Technology Terms

Analytics (Web & Mobile)

Analytics in the context of MarTech refers to the data captured from a brand’s owned and operated properties. Analytics tools enable brands to understand how their digital destinations are performing and the way audiences are engaging with them. Web analytics provides information such as the total number of visitors to a web page, performance of specific pages and e-commerce data. The field of mobile analytics includes mobile web and app data, such as interaction with features, navigation and monetisation statistics. Both areas include a vast suite of tools and metrics that provide a detailed picture of overall audience and customer engagement.

Content Management System (CMS)

A content management system is a platform used to create, store and manage digital assets. The platforms provide multiple users with access to brand-approved content such as business information and images used in the course of everyday marketing operations. Different permission levels can be set up enabling users to edit, distribute, publish or simply discover content. It includes systems that facilitate collaborative authoring of a website or app, as well as document and digital asset management for version control.

Content Syndication

Content Syndication is the practice of distributing content on relevant 3rd party websites to provide increased reach and visibility – beyond a brand’s owned and operated website. Syndicated content can be a complete copy of something published on a brand’s own website or a smaller section of it (such as a snippet or even thumbnail). The aim of content syndication is to align with digital properties that are relevant to a brand’s product or service, in order to access interested and sought-after audiences. It is generally considered a top of the funnel marketing activity, designed to build awareness and put a brand in the consideration set of a customer when they are ready to purchase.

Customer Experience (CX)

Customer experience refers to all of the interactions that someone has with a brand throughout the consumer lifecycle. This includes both the offline and online touch-points, from in-store promotions to the functionality in a brand’s mobile app. CX typically refers to the delivery of a customer’s digital experience and takes into account content, design and usability of things like the website, mobile app, e-commerce platform etc. Good CX will help brands not only meet their customer’s needs and expectations, but exceed them.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

A Customer Relationship Management platform is the central repository of the information a company has on its customer contact base. The use of a CRM platform is generally more common in businessto-business (B2B) than business to consumer (B2C) marketing. The CRM enables businesses to track, manage and analyse interactions throughout the customer lifecycle. A variety of information sources can feed into a CRM platform, including data sourced from engagement on a company’s website, a live chat and sign-up data.

Data Visualisation Platform

A Data Visualisation Platform is software that helps marketers bring together the multitude of data outputs from different systems (eg. advertising performance, website analytics and offline sales stats) and analyse them into graphical representations that demonstrate patterns, trends and correlations. Most data visualisation platforms will easily connect to common MarTech systems through an API (see bridging terms). They also enable businesses to customise dashboards using language that aligns with their internal terminology, making data-driven insights more accessible and relevant.

Digital Asset Management (DAM)

Digital Asset Management platforms are used by enterprises to organise, store and share content for business use. This commonly includes images, photos, creative files, audio, video, documents, presentations and more. It is an essential tool for ensuring version control and compliance with brand and regulatory guidelines, particularly when multiple stakeholders are working on projects. DAM software has evolved to support creative approvals and serve as a centralised hub for content distribution across channels including social platforms, the website and other media.

e-Commerce Platform

An e-Commerce Platform refers to the engine powering a brand’s online store. It includes the section of the website or mobile app where the customer completes an online purchase or transaction, helps manage inventory and can provide other functionality to fulfil orders. An e-Commerce platform can also extract valuable customer data at the point of purchase and feed into systems such as website analytics and/or a data management platform. This enables a brand to customise future communication with customers, making it more personalised to potentially drive both loyalty and repeat purchases.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is one of the many channels a brand uses to communicate with its audience. As a direct form of communication, email campaigns are enhanced when messages are personalised, subscribers are segmented and emails are mobile responsive. It is important in the context of the overall experience a customer has with a brand and can be used for on-boarding and loyalty, as well as to encourage new sales

Marketing Automation

Marketing automation is the concept that underpins the use of MarTech. It encompasses the multitude of platforms that help companies improve engagement with customers and increase efficiency by automating manual tasks and processes.

Marketing Resource Management (MRM)

Marketing Resource Management helps brands manage the production of content and collateral in a systemic fashion. Closely aligned with CRM and DAM systems (both covered in this section), a good MRM approach helps marketing departments to produce and dispatch assets and manage workflows. A key objective of MRM is effective brand management – most can be set up to templatise the look and feel of content, along with appropriate messages to deliver to customers.

Personalisation Engine

A Personalisation Engine is software that powers a brand’s owned and operated channels (website,
mobile app, email etc) to deliver customised experiences for users based on what is known about them.
This data-driven approach can dynamically tailor content like messaging, imagery and offers based on
customer attributes, previous behaviour or interests.

This service is typically used to drive online retailer and entertainment offerings, and on social media
platforms. It is also used to improve customer engage-ment and conversion, branding, and to increase
the time that consumers spend on particular websites.

Personally Identifiable Information (PII)

Personally Identifiable Information is data that uniquely identifies a consumer. PII is deterministic – ie. you know it is the person, as opposed to probabilistic – meaning it is likely to be the person. The data can include full name, address, email address and date of birth, for instance. PII data is mostly collected when consumers sign up for services and share personal profile details. There are strict laws in place about ascertaining, storing and using PII for marketing and advertising purposes.

Predictive Analytics

Predictive analytics tools facilitate an advanced kind of analysis that uses marketing and advertising data to pre-empt what consumers are most likely to do next. Brands apply predictive analytics to gain a more informed view of their audience and customise future advertisements to increase relevance. For example, several historical data points such as salary, payment history and browsing behaviour can help determine if someone is likely to become a credit card customer or not.

Social Listening

Social listening tools (also known as social media monitoring) help a brand to monitor online conversations and comments relevant to their business on social platforms including blogs, forums, news sites and community pages like Facebook.

The tools identify patterns, track sentiment and provide insights enabling brands to respond to consumer demands and concerns in real time, as well as gain feedback to improve products and services. Sophisticated strategies can also link into the CRM to build a more complete profile of a customer or prospect with the ultimate goal of better serving target audiences.

Social Media

Social Media represents the total social media presence of a brand on the internet. The umbrella term can include networks and communities on social platforms, along with paid advertising. It typically includes publishers such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Snapchat.

The social pages of a brand can feature an overview of its products and services, e-commerce functions, community discussion forums, latest announcements and other information aimed at building consumer engagement and interest.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

Search engine optimisation refers to the discipline of building and updating a brand’s website to get the highest possible rank in organic (non-paid) search results. It includes content optimisation, meta tagging and site structure. Websites that deliver good content and a positive user experience (such as quick page load speeds) rank higher in search results, meaning users are more likely to click-through to pages. SEO is generally considered a continuous process, rather than an end result.

Tag Management System

A tag is a piece of code that helps track users’ online behaviour and engagement with a brand’s assets, whether on the website, with a digital ad or with an email. Brands with an extensive digital presence (website, mobile app, social media pages, large digital ad spends etc) commonly have a high volume of digital marketing and advertising tags. A tag management system helps manage these tags and ensures all possible touchpoints with prospects and customers are tracked. Solutions inside tag management can include campaign analytics, audience measurement and conversion tracking tools.

User Experience (UX)

User Experience is a subset of customer experience (see CX). In relation to MarTech, it refers to the ease with which customers can use and navigate a brand’s digital properties and assets, such as the website and mobile app. User experience can be impacted by things like extended load times, difficulty navigating between page/sections or simply not being able to find the information they are seeking. A positive user experience can significantly increase a customer’s overall satisfaction, loyalty and perception of a brand.